4 ms·

In broad strokes, my ideal safety net would be means tested (if you are poorer you get more) but gradually phase out as income increases in order to incentivize

In broad strokes, my ideal safety net would be means tested (if you are poorer you get more) but gradually phase out as income increases in order to incentivize working, be a cash transfer to let people spend however they want without layers of make-work bureaucracy and political lobbying (farm lobby pushing food stamps, etc.), and be actually funded rather than through deficit spending.

pvg 8y ago
That sounds a lot like food stamps, if you scrape the ideological patina off it.
- seibelj 8y ago
  No, this is nothing like foodstamps. Foodstamps can only be used for approved products in the food category. This encourages certain industries, such as farmers, to lobby for increased welfare dollars to flow to foodstamps. It also requires an enormous bureaucracy to manage the foodstamp program and creates a political agenda and interest groups around it. We should eliminate existing welfare programs, of which there are many, and turn it into a simple cash transfer to the recipient's bank account. If society wants to give $X in welfare to person Y, then let's give $X to person Y and not have all of the other drama and waste around it.
  - zjaffee 8y ago
    The reason why food stamps work and wealth transfers don't is that increasing food production to match the demand that food stamps add isn't all that difficult, especially given that so much food already goes to waste. A direct transfer of money that could then be spent on things like housing or healthcare doesn't result in an increased production of those goods as it stands today since it won't result in a rapid increase in the number of doctors or the amount of housing available at lower price points. I keep seeing conservative/libertarian groups propose things such as negative income taxes and UBI, but feeding the beast that is capitalism wont necessarily provide individuals substantially better conditions than exist today without additional major policy changes.
    - seibelj 8y ago
      A free market is the most efficient way to distribute resources and it does this via price signals. Quantifying welfare as a single number, paid for in dollars, is maximally efficient. What you are arguing for is to split welfare into buckets, such as the food bucket (SNAP) and the housing bucket (rent control), but still let individuals spend freely within that bucket. It’s an argument, but I think the simple solution is just to have one bucket and trust that individuals know what they need to spend money on best. The twist you have, that food is a unique resource we grow too much of and SNAP is essentially free because we use food that would be wasted, is very strange and I haven’t heard it before. I don’t think government purchasers buy food from the trash pile, it all comes from the market.
      - macintux 8y ago
        > trust that individuals know what they need to spend money on best Have you met people who struggle with addiction? I suspect placing money explicitly into a food bucket is the only thing keeping a lot of children fed.
        seibelj 8y ago
        This is paternalism, and philosophically I think it’s best to let the individual decide what’s best for them rather than society telling people what to buy. You are essentially saying that the poor cannot be trusted to know what they need, whereas I think the poor are intelligent, rational people who will allocate their resources best.
        macintux 8y ago
        I've helped keep a young drug addict alive for the past several years. I can assure you that good financial planning, and decision-making in general, does not always coincide with poverty. And it's fine to argue that if people make poor decisions, they should be allowed to suffer the consequences, but that downplays the consequences that those around them suffer as well, especially children. It's perfectly reasonable to say the money should be in a single bucket, but don't delude yourself that people are rational actors.
  - pvg 8y ago
    It's pretty much like SNAP, as I said, minus ideological cruft. SNAP is means tested and cash-like. Farmers are lobbying for more SNAP? Do you have some references about that? I haven't been able to find much. You get to buy most non-prepared food on the open market, it's not like you stand in line to receive a government-procured potato. As to 'enormous bureaucracy' - over 93% of SNAP funds go to directly to benefits. As far as I can tell, your idea is pretty similar to SNAP but you don't want to say it is because, I dunno, government and welfare are bad. That is, in the words of political economist W. Sobchak, an ethos but it's not all that much of a serious argument.
    - seibelj 8y ago
      Agriculture is an enormously important industry in the US and agriculture lobbyists are extremely embedded in the government, from farm-state senators, to insurance, to tariffs, to myriad tax breaks. Arguing that farmers don’t influence government, SNAP being one issue of many, is laughable
      - pvg 8y ago
        That's an 'everything is related to everything' argument about something that I did't actually say.
thaumasiotes 8y ago
> would be means tested (if you are poorer you get more) but gradually phase out as income increases in order to incentivize working What's "in order to incentivize working"? That feature is infamous for the fact that it disincentivizes working. Incentives not to work don't get any more direct than paying people not to work.
- seibelj 8y ago
  If you decrease the amount provided by welfare less than the increase in earnings through wages, you slowly decrease the support. So if you made $100 in welfare, then you earn $100, you now get say $75 of welfare, for $175 total income. This continues until welfare reaches $0. This is very standard economic thinking.
  - thaumasiotes 8y ago
    Sure, and it's a disincentive to work. The welfare program you describe taxes those $100 of earnings at a rate of 25%. Fewer people will be willing to do $100 of work for $75 than would do it for $100. Or working in the other direction, that welfare program represents a standing offer to people working for $100 that it will pay them $25 to quit.
    - function_seven 8y ago
      You're misunderstanding. If you do 0 work, you get $100 of welfare. If you do $100-worth of work, you get your wages plus $75 of welfare. You net more money working than not working. This is opposed to having benefits "fall off a cliff" if you earn above a certain threshold, which is very much a disincentive to work. Instead, the benefits gradually taper off so that each step toward more employment is always a net positive for the worker.
      - thaumasiotes 8y ago
        What exactly do you think I'm misunderstanding? Try to identify something I said that you think is a mistake. There is no difference, to the recipient, between "getting $100 of welfare and $75 of the $100 I earned working", or "getting $75 of my $100 of welfare and the full amount of the $100 I earned working". And there is no perspective from which a means-tested welfare program in which benefits phase out with increasing income does not represent a disincentive to work.

pvg 8y ago

That sounds a lot like food stamps, if you scrape the ideological patina off it.

seibelj 8y ago
No, this is nothing like foodstamps. Foodstamps can only be used for approved products in the food category. This encourages certain industries, such as farmers, to lobby for increased welfare dollars to flow to foodstamps. It also requires an enormous bureaucracy to manage the foodstamp program and creates a political agenda and interest groups around it. We should eliminate existing welfare programs, of which there are many, and turn it into a simple cash transfer to the recipient's bank account. If society wants to give $X in welfare to person Y, then let's give $X to person Y and not have all of the other drama and waste around it.
- zjaffee 8y ago
  The reason why food stamps work and wealth transfers don't is that increasing food production to match the demand that food stamps add isn't all that difficult, especially given that so much food already goes to waste. A direct transfer of money that could then be spent on things like housing or healthcare doesn't result in an increased production of those goods as it stands today since it won't result in a rapid increase in the number of doctors or the amount of housing available at lower price points. I keep seeing conservative/libertarian groups propose things such as negative income taxes and UBI, but feeding the beast that is capitalism wont necessarily provide individuals substantially better conditions than exist today without additional major policy changes.
  - seibelj 8y ago
    A free market is the most efficient way to distribute resources and it does this via price signals. Quantifying welfare as a single number, paid for in dollars, is maximally efficient. What you are arguing for is to split welfare into buckets, such as the food bucket (SNAP) and the housing bucket (rent control), but still let individuals spend freely within that bucket. It’s an argument, but I think the simple solution is just to have one bucket and trust that individuals know what they need to spend money on best. The twist you have, that food is a unique resource we grow too much of and SNAP is essentially free because we use food that would be wasted, is very strange and I haven’t heard it before. I don’t think government purchasers buy food from the trash pile, it all comes from the market.
    - macintux 8y ago
      > trust that individuals know what they need to spend money on best Have you met people who struggle with addiction? I suspect placing money explicitly into a food bucket is the only thing keeping a lot of children fed.
      - seibelj 8y ago
        This is paternalism, and philosophically I think it’s best to let the individual decide what’s best for them rather than society telling people what to buy. You are essentially saying that the poor cannot be trusted to know what they need, whereas I think the poor are intelligent, rational people who will allocate their resources best.
        macintux 8y ago
        I've helped keep a young drug addict alive for the past several years. I can assure you that good financial planning, and decision-making in general, does not always coincide with poverty. And it's fine to argue that if people make poor decisions, they should be allowed to suffer the consequences, but that downplays the consequences that those around them suffer as well, especially children. It's perfectly reasonable to say the money should be in a single bucket, but don't delude yourself that people are rational actors.
- pvg 8y ago
  It's pretty much like SNAP, as I said, minus ideological cruft. SNAP is means tested and cash-like. Farmers are lobbying for more SNAP? Do you have some references about that? I haven't been able to find much. You get to buy most non-prepared food on the open market, it's not like you stand in line to receive a government-procured potato. As to 'enormous bureaucracy' - over 93% of SNAP funds go to directly to benefits. As far as I can tell, your idea is pretty similar to SNAP but you don't want to say it is because, I dunno, government and welfare are bad. That is, in the words of political economist W. Sobchak, an ethos but it's not all that much of a serious argument.
  - seibelj 8y ago
    Agriculture is an enormously important industry in the US and agriculture lobbyists are extremely embedded in the government, from farm-state senators, to insurance, to tariffs, to myriad tax breaks. Arguing that farmers don’t influence government, SNAP being one issue of many, is laughable
    - pvg 8y ago
      That's an 'everything is related to everything' argument about something that I did't actually say.

thaumasiotes 8y ago

> would be means tested (if you are poorer you get more) but gradually phase out as income increases in order to incentivize working What's "in order to incentivize working"? That feature is infamous for the fact that it disincentivizes working. Incentives not to work don't get any more direct than paying people not to work.

seibelj 8y ago
If you decrease the amount provided by welfare less than the increase in earnings through wages, you slowly decrease the support. So if you made $100 in welfare, then you earn $100, you now get say $75 of welfare, for $175 total income. This continues until welfare reaches $0. This is very standard economic thinking.
- thaumasiotes 8y ago
  Sure, and it's a disincentive to work. The welfare program you describe taxes those $100 of earnings at a rate of 25%. Fewer people will be willing to do $100 of work for $75 than would do it for $100. Or working in the other direction, that welfare program represents a standing offer to people working for $100 that it will pay them $25 to quit.
  - function_seven 8y ago
    You're misunderstanding. If you do 0 work, you get $100 of welfare. If you do $100-worth of work, you get your wages plus $75 of welfare. You net more money working than not working. This is opposed to having benefits "fall off a cliff" if you earn above a certain threshold, which is very much a disincentive to work. Instead, the benefits gradually taper off so that each step toward more employment is always a net positive for the worker.
    - thaumasiotes 8y ago
      What exactly do you think I'm misunderstanding? Try to identify something I said that you think is a mistake. There is no difference, to the recipient, between "getting $100 of welfare and $75 of the $100 I earned working", or "getting $75 of my $100 of welfare and the full amount of the $100 I earned working". And there is no perspective from which a means-tested welfare program in which benefits phase out with increasing income does not represent a disincentive to work.